Windy Acres

do anything with the last of the tomatoes today. We picked them and pulled the vines a few days ago. Hubby has mowed the garden and is working on the tiller to get it all worked up for the winter. Anyway, the tomatoes were top on the list for today, but I seemed to find enough other things to do all day. I really wanted some more canned and now that I have them, I can't seem to make myself get to them. Why is that? They are not real nice, most very small and some have bad spots, so I think I will make juice out of what I can salvage now. It will NEED to be done tomorrow as we will be gone all day Saturday.

We will be going to an exotic sale Saturday, it is held near here 3 times a year. We always enjoy it, you just never know what might be there. We do not plan to buy much.........famous last words, I know. The only thing we are really looking for is a couple of doves. We got a really neat big cage this spring and have not gotten anything to put in it. Usually things sell really cheap at the fall sale as folks are thinning out before winter, so it is a good time to buy if there is something we need. We don't have anything to take to sell this time either. We are going to take the last puppy we saved from Sophie's litter and see if we can give her away. We intended to keep her, but just do not need one more dog to feed. She would make someone a good farm dog and we want her to go to a good home!

I spent the afternoon redoing the fence in one of the goat pens. I only started out to take out a gate and replace it with a cattle panel. Well, all of it was in need of some fixin up, so ended up changing out the walk in gate and redoing all of the T-posts. I also started to enlarge their pen on the other side, got a couple of panels up, but decided to wait to move the rest of the fence............this old lady was getting tired!

We got the last freezer cleaned out this week. Well, it wasn't defrosted like it should have been, so I should say straightened out. It was sad to throw out all that needed thrown out, but it had to be done. Some things weren't marked or dated and some were just old. There is a bunch of misc. meat that I will thaw out and give the dogs along. We are doing a much better job now, always marking and dating before putting anything in the freezer. I am much more aware of the importance of keeping up with that job recently. One of the freezers is empty for the winter and all cleaned out, so we have it turned off now. Hubby stocked up on ground beef yesterday before he went to Farmers Market.

Market was very quiet yesterday, it is winding down for the year. I am glad the one I have here is over, I enjoy baking, but the pressure every Friday gets tiring.

Today was another perfect fall day here, I wish I could order about 2-3 months more of them so I could get everything done outside I want to and need to get done!

We have been blessed

Last month we were able to go into town and pick some grapes for free. I made grape jam out of them and got 18 jelly jars. I prefer jam to jelly and think it is easier to make anyway. At the same time a friend called and offered peaches, I intended to go and pick some of them for jam, but about that time it started raining and raining and I didn't make it. We had purchased 2 bushel of peaches also just a few days before she called and I needed to get them taken care of first. I mostly made frozen pie fillings out of them, and saved some out to eat fresh, today I made some peach butter out of some of the ones left. I should say am making peach butter as I type............that takes a long time! Our neighbor has apple trees that he told us to just pick what we wanted, he wasn't going to use any of them. We have picked some and I have made apple crisp and some things, but we need to go and see if there are more as I would like to make some applesauce. Yesterday we went to some friends house that have a CSA to pick green beans. They sent out an email the evening before stating that their fall beans were going strong and they needed help! They were guessing there were about 1000 pounds of beans to be picked and they couldn't keep up...........whew, I think he was right. We picked a little over 50 pounds and didn't make a dent in them. So, yesterday afternoon and evening we snapped beans!!! Today we canned enough for us for the winter needs. We will take some to Farmers Market, give some to Mom, and eat some fresh. As we do many times, this spring we sold too many from our garden and didn't end up canning enough for us. We planted a couple of rows this fall thinking we would can more, but the geese ate them. So, we were thrilled when we were able to get these. Today we pulled up some of the tomato plants. I was surprised at how many ripe ones there were or at least starting to turn. So, I believe that I will be able to do one more batch of salsa yet too. We dug the sweet potatoes a couple weeks ago and sold most of them, but I kept the small ones for us to eat. So, with the chickens and other meat we have in the freezer we are pretty well set for winter. The only thing we will be short on is potatoes............we eat a lot of potatoes! Some friends plant a ton of them and sold at Farmers Market. We called them the other day to see if we could buy some to store for the winter and they had sold them all. We really need to plant more next year. We are planning to enlarge the garden area so we can.

This week we moved the little pullets into another house that has an outdoor pen. They had been in the brooder house the first 4 weeks. They are so cute out running around, they really think they are grown up. We imagined little chickens running everywhere, but it went very smoothly. We made a little alleyway with boards from one house to the other and just herded them along.

A friend of ours went on a little goat buying trip, so I went over and did chores for her 2 days. The first day hubby went along and everything went smooth. The second day he stayed home to snap those beans......and I got there to find that the cattle were out and a goat also. Luckily the bull was out also, but in a different area and he didn't even see me coaxing the cows back in with range cubes...... I really don't know what I would have done if he had been with them as I would not have tackled the job of getting him in by myself! He was away from the road and safe so I just left him alone.

We have been enjoying the most perfect fall days.........I am truly Thankful for those too. Today the sky was so blue and the breeze had a little cool feel to it, with the sun shine, just perfect. Thank you Lord for spoiling us.

The folks with the CSA gave me a couple of tomatoes to try. Nebraska Wedding and Georgia Peach. They are heirlooms so I am saving the seeds.

I got some extra milk this evening at the local dairy and plan to try to make some cheese. I have wanted to do this for a long time. If I don't get to it, I can freeze the milk. We go through spells of using a lot of milk and then times when we use very little. We are not milk drinkers, so unles the grandkids are here, it is just what I use in cooking and baking.

There are so many things that need done outdoors these nice days, I sure hope we have some more of them. Sheds to clean, painting to do, garden to finish up, windows to wash.........I am sure a few more things as well. I did cut some flowers this week to root and keep over the winter. I am afraid we will have an early frost and I wanted to be sure and get them in. I still have some geraniums to bring in, but I can do that when they predict the frost, there are only a few of them. I also have saved some seeds, I probably have enough Hollyhock seeds for everyone! Here is a picture of them this summer, I sure enjoyed them.

Tomorrow is son Ryan and Edye's 10th wedding anniversary. Happy day to you both. How in the world can 10 years go by so fast? They are the parents of Alexis, Nicholas and Madelyn that I talk about on here quite often.

This and That and Other Stuff

Well, here I am again, it has been a long time since I blogged and it seems like I don't know where to start. I have been reading other's blogs to see what they have been up to.

I am very proud of myself if I do say so. I have a very small herb garden, most of them I started in the greenhouse this spring from seed. Well...........I actually have dried some herbs this fall. I enjoy growing them and saying I am growing some herbs, but have never really done much of anything with them up until now. It remains to be seen how much I use what I have dried, but at least it is a step in the right direction!

Speaking of seeds, we stopped at the Dollar Store yesterday to pick up some Birthday cards and noticed that the garden items were marked way down. Well, I am telling you that packets of garden seed were 2 cents. So, if you live near a Dollar Store you might want to check and see what they might have left. I also got some hanging pots and a couple of long planters for next spring. Best bargain I have seen in a long time!

Hubby had Dr. appointments in Topeka last week, so of course we went to the Goodwill store. We got a new keyboard, so you will notice that I am typing K just fine now! The Dr. talked with him about having a shot to relieve the pain in his back and legs. He is not too excited about doing this, but needs some relief if possible.

We didn't have Farmers Market yesterday. It would have been the last one of the year for our little market here. A life-long friend of our family passed away and his service was Saturday morning. I feel bad missing another Market day as we have had so many rainy weekends this summer.

Last winter we had 4-5 good customers that we met a couple of times a month for deliveries of eggs and meat. That worked out so well, so we are taking names of folks interested in the same thing for this winter. We already have about 15, so we are happy with that. This will pay for our trip to town for groceries or other errands plus a little extra income as well. Not looking forward to winter coming, many are saying it will be a hard winter. That is not good for lots of reasons. Winter is hard for us anyway, without Farmer's Market income, things are really tight. Hubby just turned 62, so his disability check turns into retirement and drops almost $100 a month?? Nice.......... Along with increases in everything else, it will be interesting.

I did one of those, I wish I had been paying attention and that wouldn't have happened, things last week. I went out to check on the goats after dark, I even took a flashlight which I don't usually do, and you guessed it.........I fell over a cattle panel laying in the grass. We had just moved some panels around that day, and that one got left where it shouldn't have! I could barely hobble to the house and really thought I wouldn't be able to walk at all the next day. However, God is so Good, although my leg is sore and bruised, it is not nearly as bad as it could have been or as I expected it to be! He protects us from things everyday big and small, and I am Thankful!

Fun recipe

Because now we are all only five minutes away from chocolate cake any time of the day or night!!!***

A Beautiful Day

Remember that long list I had to start on today? Well, I didn't actually get many things done, but seemed to stay busy all day! Just little things that don't seem important but needed doing I guess.

We moved some of the goat girls with Bubba. We had gotten a breeding harness for him so we would have a due date for the girls, well we put it on him and went to get the girls, when we got them to him, he had already lost the harness. Guess we aren't very good at dressing a goat? Anyway, I can't wait for babies, just a little over 5 months to go................

Hubby mowed and boy was it needed after all of the rain. He also did some mowing around and through the garden, so it is a little neater. We had a pile of hay along the side that was to be mulch and never used, so I moved that to the compost pile. It was hungry for some brown stuff, it has had plenty of green this summer. I am not very good at getting the correct amount of each, but I hope it will eventually turn into some good soil.

We did a little toward putting up a fence around the poultry area. We are going to use hog panels and enclose a larger area for all of the birds. The plan is to not allow them into the garden area or yard close to the house where I have flowers. Some of them can and I suppose will fly over since hog panels are not very tall, but it should discourage the majority anyway. I will need to do some moving around to finish, one hog panel is being used in the corral and I will replace it with a cattle panel so it can finish out this project. I did this in a hap-hazard way earlier, but now we are wanting to do it semi-permanent. It will be a pain to have to use a gate everytime I want to go in this area, but it will be better in the long run. Right now I don't let the hens out all day because they get into too much trouble!

It was the most beautiful day today, one of those that you wish would last until next spring!! And the full moon tonight is awesome. God is Good!!

Relaxing Sunday with some Sunshine

We ended up with almost 6 inches of rain over the last few days, so needless to say a little soggy around here. However, I got up at 4 something this morning to go to the bathroom, and saw a full bright moon shining outdoors! I was so excited to see it meaning NO CLOUDS. This morning also brought sunshine which is good for the soul! I can't say that it lasted all day, but off and on we saw the sun and at least no more rain. The forecast for the next several days is for nice days...............Yipee! Maybe I will be able to get a few things done outdoors now. Actually my list includes indoor things as well. I sat down this afternoon and made a list for the next few days.......and it ended up being an entire page long. I doubt that I get even most of it done, but I am sure going to give it a try.

Last evening Mom called and thought it was a good night to go to Wendy's to eat, she thought we all needed to get out because of the gloomy day. This is only 7 miles from us, so it is a nice little outing every once in a while.

This morning right before church time Rlyn brought the little princess down. She went to church with me and enjoyed the story time and childrens church as well as seeing Great Grandma there. Came home and Grandpa had dinner ready, as soon as we finished eating Rlyn came to get her. He fixed a plate and warmed it up and ate before they left. She wasn't here very long, but we had fun. She got to see the baby chics, which is one of her favorite things on the farm. She is in pre-school Mon, Wed, Fri this year now, so her time with us will be limited.

We voted on the search committee at church this morning, so they will get started soon with the large job of finding a new pastor for our little church. I and I believe most others at least really are enjoying the couple that are filling in for us right now. They are so interested in us and willing to be a part of our church, a real blessing!

This Sunday afternoon was very relaxing, a nap was the main activity, other than doing dishes and chores. I have caught up on reading some blogs which I really enjoy doing.

My eyboard is not wor ing right............as you can tell, the is not wor ing! I have tried to thin of words that don't use the . This is ind of frustrating!!

Rain, Rain go Away............

Come again someother day!! We are getting the tail end of some hurricane, don't remember which one. I do not want to complain about the rain as although there were tornadoes in our part of the state this afternoon, we are not facing anything that the people in Texas are! My prayers are with them tonight as they prepare for the worst. We have had 31/2 inches so far, it has been a nice gentle rain. I tried 3 times to do chores this afternoon. I would get a few things done and then it would start to rain, I came in and went out when it quit for a few minutes and did a few more things, finally finished up in the rain. I must say I feel so sorry for our goats, they do not go out and get wet!! They have spent most of the last 2 days in the shed waiting for the rain to stop so they could go out and eat.

Another down side, we will not be doing Farmer's Maret again tomorrow morning. At least we had plenty of warning of the rain this time. This is the 7th Saturday morning this summer with rain! Usually we have at least 1, but 7?? Because of the forecast I had the day off today, no breads or rolls or pies. Let me tell you, I have had the day off in every way. Since I didn't have to do the usual I guess I felt blah and lazy, just no energy at all. Of course the cloudy, dreary weather does that to me anyway, I really need sunshine to function well. They are saying starting Monday it will be nice again, I can hold on until then.....

The little chics are doing well. We have lost 3, but that isn't bad out of 200 plus. They are growing and so cute.

We went to the state fair on Tuesday. That was the only decent day weatherwise and that is the day we had planned to go anyway. The goat show was that day and we enjoyed watching some of that. That gave us a chance to sit down and rest. Nothing really new at the fair, but we really enjoy seeing the exhibits.

Monday evening I went with Nicholas to his 4-H meeting as Mom and Dad were both busy that evening. It was fun to be able to go with him. He had refreshments that night.............so here is Grandma with Nicholas, Maddy, lemonade, brownie muffins, cups, pop cans to turn in, the car seat, diaper bag, and probably some other things............whew, I am not used to all of that! I used to do it all of the time, but it has been a while! Lets just say that I admire you gals with several little ones!

I have 20 peach pie fillings in the freezer. Still have a few in the fridge to use up. I may can them tomorrow. Haven't done anything with the apples yet, will have to get busy with them starting Monday.

Yesterday was Granddaughter, Jamee's 18th birthday..........hope she enjoyed it!

Chocolate Stars.............

are a fond childhood memory! Today hubby had a Dr. appointment so we were off to Topeka for most of the day. I went to Goodwill while he was at the Dr. office, more on that in a minute, we then ate a very late lunch and went to the grocery store. In passing the candy isle I noticed right on the end a bag of chocolate stars. I mentioned to hubby when I caught up with him that I saw them and hadn't seen them for a long time and didn't even know if they still made them. Ok, we stop at another little store on the way home to check out any specials they might have and you guessed it, I saw another bag of chocolate stars...............I really am not looking for chocolate stars, honestly. I said, "there are chocolate stars again". Next thing I know hubby has grabbed a bag and we are on our way to the check out. (Not too fast, I ran into an old friend and we had a nice little chat.) So on the way home we snack on......Chocolate Stars!! Now, for the meaning behind this story. When I was little and my folks and I would go to Emporia shopping Mom would buy chocolate stars and we would eat some on the way home. My Daddy really enjoyed them. So they brought back a very fond memory for me.

Well, I had a great Goodwill shopping trip. I found 6 pair of slacks in various colors that fit me! I tried on a couple more that didn't fit perfectly so put them back. Most times I would be happy enough with the way they fit and made do. I couldn't believe what was available today. Also got 2 knit tops and a pretty little soap dispenser for the bathroom for 68 cents.

The phone rang this morning with the news that our chicks were at the post office. We had plenty of time to get them settled in before having to leave. They seemed pretty happy when we got home, had only lost one.

I was very thankful that they did not come yesterday as the weather was COLD! It was 52 when I got up and never got above 57 all day! Today started out pretty chilly, but this afternoon the sun came out and was really nice later.

That cool weather made for a nice day to work in the kitchen. I made 6 batches of grape jam, it is yummy! Got 6 peach pie fillings frozen. And one ready to use tomorrow. Also am working on 14 day sweet pickles this week. I hope to get apples picked tomorrow. However since we were running around today, I didn't get any baking done for Saturday's Market..........so tomorrow will be a busy day. One good thing (I guess) is that we don't have produce to get ready now. That really takes a lot of time to pick and wash.

Busy Summer Days

These days have been busy ones. Last week we had almost 200 broilers processed. The end of the week brought many visitors to our little homestead. We were blessed with folks wanting to buy critters! While it is hard to see them go, I realize that with winter coming and feed prices rising it is necessary. We were able to sell some extra Muscovy male ducks, all of a small breed of ducks, some laying hens, and 3 goats. The goats were ones that had problems kidding in the past, so they needed a home where they were wanted just for eating weeds and being pets. We are wanting to cut down on hens for the winter, feed costs are too high to have a lot of hens to feed when they stop laying. We have 200 chicks coming tomorrow or Thursday to replace them. They should be starting to lay about February. We need to get on a schedule in the future so we will have some pullets starting to lay about now for eggs through the winter months.

So, first thing in the morning we have to get the place ready for the new chicks. I have the feeders and waters out, but still have to wash them up. Intended to get that done today, but it didn't happen.

Today was quite warm again, but it is cool tonight. Tomorrow's high is to be in the upper 60's.............Sounds like fall doesn't it!

We picked some grapes last evening, got 2 bushels of peaches today and have apples to pick at the neighbors asap. Sounds like I will be busy for a while. Our tomatoes have really slowed down to almost nothing. I sure hope they will produce some more as I would like to do some more canning of them. Another neighbor offered me some if not.

We plan to put a few does in with Bubba our little buck this week. I don't think we should put them all in at once since he is young. All of those girls flirting with him might scare him. lol Since the sale of the does over the weekend that leaves us with 20 does, which is a good number for us. Some of them need a little more time to get into good shape before breeding anyway. Some have had worm problems over the summer and need a little extra feed.

Hubby got my clothesline poles put up recently, one little problem, he put them up at his height instead of mine! I suppose standing on tippy toes to hang things up is good exercise?? Anyway, I will enjoy using them............the smell of things hung outdoors is priceless!

The old wooden pole is shown in the picture, it now is a hanging flower pot holder...........

One more picture to share with you, a couple of weeks ago our kids were here and I happened to get this picture of hubby with the grandkids.

I have one question.........where did our summer go? How can it possibly be Labor Day...........the end of summer already?? Any of you that know me well at all, know for a fact that I prefer summer to winter. It is hard for me to enjoy the beautiful fall weather because I am sure it means winter is coming soon after. Actually, by this time of the year, we are getting pretty tired after all of the summer activities and I am finding myself looking forward to a slower pace as winter approaches.

We have been blessed with such a nice summer this year! I don't remember many years in Kansas that we had to mow quite this often after the 4th of July. Everything is so pretty and green yet.........and the garden has been wonderful for us. We have enjoyed eating, canning, freezing, and selling at Farmer's Market! About the only thing left is tomatoes and they have really slowed down, I was in hopes I would be able to make another batch of salsa or two yet, but we will see. We do have some fall beans planted and they are doing well, and the sweet potatoes look nice.

We so enjoyed spending some quality time with our grandson, Nick at the county fairs this summer. This was his first year in 4-H, his projects were foods and goats. It was fun to watch him learn and try so many new things. Of course you know that Grandma had as much fun as Nick did. I still enjoy the county fair as much as I did when I was a 4-Her a few years ago...........

He did very well for his first year, coming home with all blue ribbons! In foods he exhibited trail mix, chocolate chip cookies and rocky road fudge brownie muffins. Here he is showing one of the goats, Rain Drop at the Overbrook fair.

Speaking of goats, and I usually am, I have some sad news to share. Most of you know my first little goat, Bucky, he has been the center of attention at our Nativity scenes, made several appearances at the Lebo 4th of July parades, and just had a special place here at the farm. He was a bottle baby and lived in the house with us for the first 3 weeks of his life, he then had the run of the farmyard for about a year. Finally after getting other goats he moved in with them, however he never really figured out that he was a goat. Well, sadly he died last Tuesday.............. He had been sick for about a week and I had treated him with everything I could think of. He seemed to respond and I would think he was going to be ok, and then would relapse. I had let him out to run around the yard the last week and the night before he died he wanted in the barn where he called home that first year, so I guess it is fitting that that is where I found him the next morning.

Some happier thoughts, baby chicks are coming this week! Who can resist cuddly baby chicks? We have 200 pullets ordered, they will be our layers next summer. Because of these replacements, some of our current layers will be for sale later this fall. So if you are wanting a few egg layers of your own check with us.

*We also have a new batch of broiler chickens available right now. They were processed this past week. I would say they average about 4 pounds. Some of you have already picked up your order. Let us know right away if you would like some, as these will most likely be the last ones available until next spring.

We have found a home for Black Jack, our donkey. He is such a sweetheart and will be greatly missed here, especially his wonderful voice! However he could not be trusted with baby goats and that was always a worry! So, he left yesterday for his new home near Osage. He is on loan and will be working for his keep now, training 4-H calves to lead. He will be returning here to appear in our annual Live Nativity scene this December.

We have a puppy that needs a home (now at least think about it), she is a nice little dog about 5 months old. Her name is Sassy. She is English Shepherd/Anatolian Shepherd cross, which will make an excellent farm dog. She loves kids, is used to other dogs, cats, poultry, goats and whatever else we have around here. We would love to keep her, but we already have Sadie, Sophie, Rowdy and Shadow........don't you think that is enough? They are all working farm dogs except Shadow of course who is the spoiled house dog!

I have not been able to keep up very well this summer with my blog, but please do check it out when you have time. As things slow down I hope to do a better job. http://www.homesteadblogger.com/heritagehill/

I shoulda, but I didn't

We have been blessed

This and That and Other Stuff

Fun recipe

A Beautiful Day

Relaxing Sunday with some Sunshine

Rain, Rain go Away............

Chocolate Stars.............

Busy Summer Days

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